Massive leak reveals secret dossiers on 759 captives
The Guantanamo Files New York Times and Guardian
() For all the sensitive types that can't read actual wikileak files with out having tanks on your lawn or SWAT teams down your chimney, please rest assured that none of my links here or inside lead directly to *sekrets*) [more inside]
posted by adamvasco
on Apr 25, 2011 -
391 comments

Just before intermission, Cowie took the stage and began juggling a ball with her feet until suddenly she popped it in the air, swished her right foot around the ball twice, kicked it up again, then rotated her left foot around once without letting the ball touch the floor. She bent her right foot back behind her body and caught the ball on the sole of her shoe. “I could feel the excitement building in the auditorium,” she recalled. “I could hear the oohs and the aahs. I could sense the shock.” ¶ For her finale, Cowie lay on her back and juggled the ball over her head with her feet. As they applauded, Green Hope students turned to their friends with the same question: Who is she?

... the International Music Score Library Project, has trod in the footsteps of Google Books and Project Gutenberg and grown to be one of the largest sources of scores anywhere. It claims to have 85,000 scores, or parts for nearly 35,000 works, with several thousand being added every month. That is a worrisome pace for traditional music publishers, whose bread and butter comes from renting and selling scores in expensive editions backed by the latest scholarship. More than a business threat, the site has raised messy copyright issues and drawn the ire of established publishers.(previously)
posted by Joe Beese
on Feb 22, 2011 -
23 comments

Chasing Pirates: Inside Microsoft’s War Room - From the special thread that Chinese factories counterfeit in mile-long spools that adorns software authenticity stickers, to near-perfect bootleg discs leaving microscopic evidence of their factory origins, to Mexican and Russian gangsters who are dealt with very carefully, the NYT covers Microsoft's multi-pronged, international war on piracy.
posted by Blazecock Pileon
on Nov 7, 2010 -
30 comments

A Year at War: One Battalion's Wrenching Deployment to Afghanistan: "Some 30,000 American soldiers are taking part in the Afghanistan surge. Here are the stories of the men and women of First Battalion, 87th Infantry of the 10th Mountain Division" out of Fort Drum, NY., based in Kunduz Province, Afghanistan. Over the next year, The New York Times will follow their journey, chronicling the battalion’s part in the surge in northern Afghanistan and the impact of war on individual soldiers and their families back home. (First link is an interactive feature containing images and autoplaying video, and requires flash. Second link is a standard-style article.)[more inside]
posted by zarq
on Oct 21, 2010 -
28 comments

Is this just another version of the minstrel show? The Pendleton Round-up is celebrating its 100th anniversary. Part of its attraction is the performance of a "American Indian" dance pageant, whose participants are compensated traditionally. "A century later, the mill still provides blankets, and families are still paid to appear, $5 per person each day at the arena. Beef and vegetables are provided, as are tokens for other food. The winner of the “Best Dressed Indian Award” at the parade gets 50 silver dollars. The winner of the “Oldest Indian Couple Award” gets 100 silver dollars in a pouch."
posted by Xurando
on Sep 24, 2010 -
17 comments

Best selling authors Jennifer Weiner and Jodi Picoult speak out about how the New York Times treats "chick lit": "when a man writes about family and feelings, it's literature with a capital L, but when a woman considers the same topics, it's romance, or a beach book - in short, it's something unworthy of a serious critic's attention."[more inside]
posted by roomthreeseventeen
on Aug 26, 2010 -
85 comments

The Web Never Forgets. Are youthful indiscretion verboten in this digital age? As we grow and move forward - we make mistakes, we say things we later regret, or we change our mind about stuff all the time. But in era where even the things we actrually mean to say, can be taken out of context, posted, and used as a political weapon, is there room for just being silly online anymore?
posted by helmutdog
on Jul 25, 2010 -
105 comments

Double Full Full Full, annotated (NYT video, reg REq'd) U.S. Olympic Team aerial skier Ryan St. Onge and a science reporter describe via video the physics going on as he executes a triple backflip with four twists.
Also, the snowboard halfpipe. (Don't ask me why a triple backflip with four twists is called a "double full full full")
posted by planetkyoto
on Feb 3, 2010 -
16 comments

Frank Serpico testified before the Knapp Commission in October 1971, becoming the first police officer in the United States to voluntarily give evidence against a fellow policeman. You probably have seen the movie. FrankSerpicoreturns. “I still have nightmares,” he said. “I open a door a little bit and it just explodes in my face. Or I’m in a jam and I call the police, and guess who shows up? My old cop buddies who hated me.”
posted by Xurando
on Jan 22, 2010 -
41 comments

Sick leave. In some countries it's taken for granted. In the USA it's controversial. A bill before congress would mandate 5 days of paid sick leave a year for businesses with over 15 employees. Some without sick leave are going to work sick. I'm sure you have never done this.
posted by Xurando
on Dec 17, 2009 -
160 comments

Happy Thanksgiving, MetaFilter! If you have friends from different parts of the U.S., you might have wondered why they consider certain dishes to be an essential part of a Thanksgiving feast, when you've never even thought of them as remotely Thanksgiving-related. Now you can see what dishes were popular searches on allrecipes.com in various states thanks to a series of infographics in the New York Times.
posted by grouse
on Nov 26, 2009 -
70 comments

Nina Sankovitch is about to finish reading a book a day for a year. She not only reads them, she reviews them too. "You can’t go from ‘Little Bee,’ by Chris Cleave, which is about this young woman who witnesses torture and herself is a victim of abuse in Nigeria — a really great book, but you’re just crying or your stomach is clenched — to another book like it the next day,” she said. “If I read a book like that every day, I would have collapsed a long time ago.”
Other 365 day projects have included this, this, and this.
posted by Xurando
on Oct 13, 2009 -
133 comments

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